The Council of Vienne

Vienne, on the Rhône · October 1311 to May 1312 · convened by Clement V · a council in the shadow of the French crown.

Clement V, the first of the Avignon popes, called the council under heavy pressure from Philip IV of France, who had arrested the Knights Templar in 1307 on charges of heresy and immorality extracted largely under torture. The council fathers were not persuaded of the order’s guilt. Clement therefore suppressed the Templars by papal provision in the bull Vox in excelso of March 22, 1312, without a judicial condemnation, and transferred their property to the Knights Hospitaller. The last Grand Master, Jacques de Molay, was burned in Paris in 1314.

The council also condemned the Beguines and Beghards, lay communities of devout women and men living without vows, accusing them of the “Free Spirit” errors.

Principal Acts

  • Suppressed the Knights Templar.
  • Condemned the Beguines and Beghards.
  • Planned a new crusade, which never sailed.
  • Ordered chairs of Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, and Chaldean at the papal court and at Paris, Oxford, Bologna, and Salamanca.

Why It Matters

The decree on languages was meant to train missionaries, and it was poorly carried out. Yet it stands at the head of a road that led to the trilingual colleges of Alcalá, Louvain, and Paris, where the humanists recovered Hebrew and Greek, and so to the Reformation’s return to Scripture in its original tongues.

Numbering. Rome reckons this the fifteenth ecumenical council. Protestants do not count it ecumenical.

The Medieval Councils

Sources

  • Norman P. Tanner, ed., Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, 2 vols. (London: Sheed & Ward; Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 1990), vol. 1. Latin and English text of the decrees.
  • Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. 6, The Middle Ages, A.D. 1294–1517 (CCEL).
  • Malcolm Barber, The Trial of the Templars, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).

Roman Catholic Councils